Album Review: Foxes In The Snow by Jason Isbell

The love songs all mean different things today It's pretty rare for an artist to give listeners something truly new nine albums in, but that's what Jason Isbell provides us with Foxes in the Snow. Previous works since the Drive-By Truckers days has appeared variously under the "Jason Isbell" or "Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit" moniker, the latter acknowledging his longtime backing band, but even his ostensibly solo efforts during this stretch have featured a bevy of contributors, resulting in a richly textured country rock sound. This tradition is now severed - all eleven songs here see Isbell going truly solo, a lone man with a voice and an acoustic guitar.

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To be specific, a mahogany Martin 0-17 acoustic from 1940. This is the chosen instrument that guides Jason Isbell's latest endeavour, Foxes in the Snow. Known for his storied collaborations with the 400 Unit and Drive-By Truckers, Isbell returns with his first solo album in the decade since 2015's Something More Than Free. Recorded over five days at New York's Electric Lady Studios, it's the singer-songwriter's inaugural acoustic full-length.

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One of the sharpest songwriters of his generation presents stark, lived-in storytelling and a performance that feels immediate and improvisatory Jason Isbell is one of the most powerful voices in modern Americana. His music is as engaging as it is influential, memorable as it is critically acclaimed. His new album, Foxes In The Snow, is a first – his first album recorded entirely solo, with just an acoustic guitar for company.

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Foxes in the Snow is the first time Jason Isbell has made an album alone. It’s a record with no backing band or instruments, just Isbell and an acoustic guitar. It’s also Isbell’s first record since his late 2023 divorce with his longtime partner, musician Amanda Shires. The couple had been public about their difficulties, in the press, online, and in the 2023 documentary about Isbell, Running With Our Eyes Closed.

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Jason Isbell hasn't "gone solo" in just one way, he's gone solo in every way. Or at least he has for a New York minute. After eight previous records under his name that featured full electric ensembles, "Foxes in the Snow" is the first album this poet laureate of American rock has made sans any accompaniment at all other than his own picking, recorded in five days last fall at NYC's Electric Lady studio with nothing but an engineer and a trusted 1940 Martin O-17 acoustic guitar for company.

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Jason Isbell's 2013 album Southeastern was a harrowing recounting of the singer-songwriter's battle with addiction. The solitary nature of the album's creation--it was recorded without his usual band, the 400 Unit--allowed Isbell's rich storytelling to take center stage. Foxes in the Snow, the Tennessee-based musician's first solo album since 2015's Something More Than Free, is a companion of sorts to Southeastern, written and recorded in the aftermath of Isbell's split from wife and bandmate Amanda Shires.

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